Valio news • 04.08.2009
Valio Profeel® – applying patent proven technology to weight management
Valio is working to produce even more tasty Profeel® weight management products and continuing to conduct research on milk to identify the most beneficial components.
Our goal is to put the technology know-how gained in developing for instance Valio Zero Lactose™ milk drink to work in finding the most effective part of milk to employ in products that support weight management after weight loss, says Dr Taru Pilvi, Senior Researcher, Valio R&D. “We know how to separate out milk components and try to select the ones that we think are most effective.”
Not all proteins are the same and there are even different milk proteins that have different effects on body weight. Milk is the only food we can be sure is meant for human consumption as it is made in the mammary gland and nowhere else. We hope to utilise the most effective fractions for weight loss products.
Are milk proteins more important than calcium?
Dr Pilvi has studied the effect of dairy protein and calcium on the prevention and treatment of obesity, and her doctoral thesis concluded that whey proteins and calcium have a beneficial effect on obesity induced problems in the liver and adipose tissue, as well as on body composition.
The scientific community’s dairy weight management research started from findings on calcium, which binds fatty acids in the intestine but whose other mechanism in the particular context is unclear. While calcium is no longer considered the silver bullet in weight management, and may yet have a role to play, research is more focused on proteins.
Proteins are now seen as a significant nutrition factor in trying to lose weight or maintain weight loss. Consumers looking to manage their weight over the long term tend to feel what’s needed is simply a good and low fat diet, while those looking to lose weight are more likely to seek out functional products.
Valio Profeel® products taste good and promote satiety and satiation
Despite consumers’ preparedness to make compromises while dieting, in terms for instance of the type and quantity of food they eat, research surprisingly indicates they aren’t prepared to compromise on taste. So Valio is combining its current taste research with weight management and other functional food concepts. For example, we are looking for alternative taste solutions and investigating options concerning intense sweeteners.
Dr Taru Pilvi’s 2008 doctoral thesis, the Effects of dairy proteins and calcium on diet-induced obesity in mice, determined that protein quality may have an important effect on weight management.
Dairy is the most delicious, convenient and practical way to satisfy the essential dietary protein intake that is a precondition for healthy and effective weight loss, or its maintenance going forward.
In dieting, we lose muscle mass as well as fat, and on starting to eat normally again quite soon regain weight but almost all in the form of fat. A cycle of dieting and weight regain therefore results in the body having more fat than before commencing the diet.
Valio Profeel® products contain beneficial proteins and fibre while fats and extra sugars have been removed, and are ideal as post diet support in preventing weight regain.
What consumers really want
Many of the assumptions one would be tempted to make about what people watching their weight wish to eat need to be carefully examined, as we are indeed doing, in order to make tailored products, something the entire industry is struggling to achieve. It’s fair to say that indications drawn from trend analyses aren’t always borne out by consumers’ true wishes and actual purchases, and modern weight loss products quite simply don’t always taste good.
What we are doing to satisfy the market need
In nutrition research, we are concentrating on finding the most beneficial components and from a technological perspective working on finding a way to utilise them in Valio Profeel® products.
We are identifying what people want weight management products to taste like, and in what form it will be easiest for them to consume the products as part of their everyday routine, separately or with meals.